Monday, May 08, 2006

Civil Liberties as an antidote to Violent Extremism

It is often asserted or assumed that American traditions of opengovernment and civil liberties place the United States at adisadvantage in confronting terrorism. But the opposite may becloser to the truth.

"In an open society like ours... it is impossible to protect againstevery threat," said President Bush in an August 24, 2005 speech."That's a fact we have to deal with. In a free society it isimpossible to protect against every possible threat," implying thatit might be possible in a closed or unfree society.

Similarly, according to February 15 testimony by Secretary of StateCondoleezza Rice, "terrorists and criminals... would exploit ouropen society to do us harm."

And "precious little can be done to prevent [terrorist attacks onsoft targets] in a society like ours that rightly values personalliberty so highly," wrote Clark Kent Ervin, former Homeland SecurityInspector General, in a Washington Post opinion piece on May 7.

But a distinctly different perspective was offered by John C. Gannon,former CIA Deputy Director for Intelligence, in testimony before theSenate Judiciary Committee last week.

Among the reasons that there has not been another terrorist attack onU.S. soil since September 11, he proposed, are precisely theopenness and freedom that some others view with anxiety.

"I believe that the hard-won Constitutional freedoms enjoyed byAmericans, along with our unparalleled commitment to civil libertiesembedded in law, work against the development of domestic terroristnetworks that could be exploited by foreigners," testified Gannon,who is now a Vice President at BAE Systems Information Technology.

http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2006_hr/050206gannon.html

Secrecy News asked Dr. Gannon to elaborate on this point.

"Americans have unparalleled Constitutional and legal protections toexpress grievances and to openly criticize government at all levels,"he replied in a May 6 email message.

"This doesn't mean that terrorists wouldn't try to operate here. Itmeans that the terrorists or other extremists would find lessfertile ground to build networks in the US because local supportwould be harder to come by and because local opposition would bemore certain."

"In this sense, our liberties are a powerful antidote to violentextremism."

"This is not an academic point for me. It is an observation from acareer of watching the domestic consequences of repressive regimeselsewhere in the world--including US-friendly Islamic governmentssuch as Saudi Arabia and Egypt," Gannon wrote.

The question of whether openness and civil liberties tend to enhancenational security or to undermine it is not a theoretical one. Muchdepends on which one of the two perspectives prevails.

If openness and the rule of law are sources of vulnerability, orviewed as such, then they will be quickly surrendered in the name ofsecurity. Torture may be redefined to permit non-lethal abuses,habeas corpus may be suspended, statutes regulating domesticsurveillance may be disregarded.

Conversely, if civil liberties and the rule of law are a source ofstrength, it follows that they should be bolstered and scrupulouslyupheld even in the conduct of vital security operations.

Secrecy News asked Dr. Gannon whether his views on civil libertiescould be reconciled with intelligence programs such as warrantlessdomestic surveillance.

"The NSA warrantless surveillance program--the details of which aremired in secrecy--should not be seen as a tradeoff between securityand civil liberties. But, for this to be true, the program must bebound by law and subject to both judicial review and competentCongressional oversight--the latter now in short supply," heexplained.

"I believe our democracy has the instruments to advance security andprotect civil liberties at the same time," he said.